The online network X has sparked major outrage after people employed its AI chatbot Grok to change pictures of females by removing their attire.
Numerous examples have been seen where the technology has been used to digitally undress women to make them appear in bikinis non-consensually, as well as to place them in sexualized scenarios.
Developer Response and Regulatory Stance
XAI, the organization that created Grok, did not respond to questions, aside from an automatically-generated message stating "traditional news outlets lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being introduced to ban nudification software. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who provided such technology would "face a prison sentence and heavy penalties".
"X or Grok has the ability to stop these forms of abuse if they chose to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with impunity."
Oversight Body Stance and Tool Functionality
The communications watchdog Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the potential" of people seeing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was currently investigating X or Grok in concerning AI-generated images.
Grok is a free AI assistant—with some premium functions—which reacts to X users' prompts when they reference it in a post.
It is often used to give reactions or more background to other users' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an posted image through its AI image editing feature.
History of Criticism and Rules
The chatbot has been condemned for permitting users to create pictures and footage with nudity and sexually suggestive material, and it was earlier accused of generating graphic material of celebrities.
"The platform has been permitting the production and spread of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have not witnessed any intervention by oversight bodies," the expert added.
XAI's own usage rules prohibits "depicting likenesses of persons in a pornographic fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was against the law to "generate or circulate deepfakes or illegal content" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes created with AI.
It said platforms such as X were required to take "necessary actions" to "reduce the danger" of users coming across unlawful content on their platforms and to delete it swiftly when they learn of it.
